Organisers celebrate MCM Expo success

By John Freeman on October 31, 2012

Last weekend’s MCM London Comic Con smashed all previous attendance records, with more than 70,000 visitors coming through the doors of ExCel.

Claimed by the organisers as Europe’s equivalent to San Diego Comic Con, MCM London Comic Con the team behind it say it has gone from strength to strength over recent years, and the latest show has seen another substantial hike in visitor numbers – 70,200 compared to the 64,000 attendees at the previous event back in May, which was itself a record figure.

“We are amazed by the turnout; we expanded the show floor space by 5,000 m2 from the May event and we were still packed,” said show co-organiser Bryan Cooney. “It is wonderful to have so many attendees and companies like BBC, C4, Universal, Nintendo and Microsoft supporting our show. We are now looking to add a further 4,000m2 for May bringing us to 21,000 m2.

“We are also looking to the future and planning alongside our venue partner to make MCM London Comic Con the biggest show of its kind in Europe.”

Running from Friday 26 to Sunday 28th October, Britain’s biggest pop culture event welcomed special guests from a host of movies, TV series and SF shows, including Doctor Who‘s Matt Smith, Hollywood legend Bill Paxton and stars from shows such as Misfits, The Walking Dead, Game of Thrones, Primeval: New World, Warehouse 13 and Continuum.

The MCM London Comic Con also played host to top games publishers such as Nintendo; Namco Bandai; Square Enix; Tecmo Koie Ubisoft; 2K Games; NIS; Konami and Microsoft. Show goers also explored the brand new VidFest UK zone celebrating online video; the UK’s largest gathering of comic artists and writers; an expanded JapanEX zone and a colourful variety of costume competitions and fashion shows, including the finals of EuroCosplay 2012.

MCM London Comic Con returns to ExCel on 24-26th May 2013. The next MCM event is the UK’s largest collectors’ show, Memorabilia, held at NEC Birmingham on 24-25th November with special guest David Hasselhoff.

• You can find more about the event at www.londonexpo.com; on Twitter at www.twitter.com/mcmexpo; on Facebook at www.facebook.com/mcmexpo and on YouTube at www.youtube.com/mcmexpo

About the Author
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John Freeman

The founder of downthetubes, which he established in 1998. John works as a comics and magazine editor, writer, and on promotional work for the Lakes International Comic Art Festival. He is currently editor of Star Trek Explorer, published by Titan – his third tour of duty on the title originally titled Star Trek Magazine.

Working in British comics publishing since the 1980s, his credits include editor of titles such as Doctor Who Magazine, Babylon 5 Magazine, and more. He also edited the comics anthology STRIP Magazine and edited several audio comics for ROK Comics. He has also edited several comic collections, including volumes of “Charley’s War” and “Dan Dare”.

He’s the writer of “Pilgrim: Secrets and Lies” for B7 Comics; “Crucible”, a creator-owned project with 2000AD artist Smuzz; and “Death Duty” and “Skow Dogs” with Dave Hailwood.

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